You access My eBay from any eBay page by clicking the My eBay link on the Navigation Bar. This opens My eBay in the My Summary view, which (as we’ll discuss in a moment) presents a general overview of all your current auction activity. My eBay actually offers several different pages, which you access by clicking the appropriate links contained in the navigation panel along the left side of the page. We’ll look at each of these pages individually.

My Summary View

The My Summary view, is the default view when you access My eBay. It consists of several distinct sections:

• My Messages, which contains important messages from eBay or from other sellers and buyers.

• Buying Reminders, which prompts you about actions you need to take regarding those items you’ve recently purchased.

• Selling Reminders, which prompts you about actions you need to take regarding those items you’ve recently sold.

• General eBay Announcements, which includes links to the most recent eBay system news.

• Items I’m Watching, which lists those auction items you’ve placed on your watch list.

• Buying Totals, which summarizes those items you’re bidding on and those you’ve won.

• Items I’m Bidding On, which lists all items you’re currently bidding on.

• Item’s I’ve Made Best Offers On, which lists those items you’ve made a best offer on, for those auctions that utilize this feature.

• Items I’ve Won, which lists recent auctions in which you were the high bidder.

• Items I Didn’t Win, which lists recent auction in which you were outbid.

• Selling Totals, which summarizes those items you currently have for sale or have recently sold.

• Items I’m Selling, which lists all items you currently have for sale.

• Items I’ve Sold, which lists all items you’ve recently sold.

One other nice thing about the My Summary view is that you can customize it to display as muchor as littleinformation as you wish. Just click the Customize Summary link near the top of the page to remove sections you don’t use often.

I use My Summary as my “home page” for all my eBay activities. It presents a great visual overview of all your important eBay activity, and lets you link directly to individual activities.

If you’re using eBay’s Selling Manager feature, the My eBay All Selling View page is replaced by a Selling Manager page. To return to the normal All Selling view, click the View My eBay Selling link.

One of the things I like about the Items I’m Selling section is the column for # of Watchers. This lists how many potential bidders have placed your item on their watch lists; it’s a good indication of total demand, and a predictor of last-minute sniping.

Like the Items I’ve Won list on the All Buying page, the Items I’ve Sold list is especially useful. The Action column lists the next action you need to take for every one of your closed auctions; click the link to perform the appropriate action.

Also useful is the Items I’m Selling list, which lets you see, in a single glance, the status of everything you’re currently selling on eBay. All items that currently have a bid higher than your minimum or reserve price are listed in green; all items that haven’t yet reached the minimum bid level are listed in red. And, at the bottom of the page, you’ll find a set of links to various selling-related services on the eBay site.

You can add items to your favorites by clicking the Add links to the right of each listAdd New Search, Add New Seller or Store, and Add New Category. From there, follow the onscreen instructions to add the items you want to appear on the All Favorites page in the future.

The My Account Summary list, at the top of the page, displays your last eBay invoice total, any payments and credits made since your last invoice, and any fees accessed since your last invoice. There’s also a section that lets you pay your eBay fees via PayPal.

The My Account page is particularly useful because it contains direct links to some of eBay’s normally well-hidden customer service features, including fees and credits, payment terms, credit card setup, credit requests, and refunds. It’s easier to click these services here than to hunt them down on eBay’s Site Map page.